Lecture 4

LECTURE 4
Enterprise Architecture and City Planning
Svyatoslav Kotusev, PhD
Copyright © 2019 by Svyatoslav Kotusev. All rights reserved.

The course of lectures on enterprise architecture by Svyatoslav Kotusev (kotusev@kotusev.com)
In This Lecture
 The similarity between organizations and cities from the
perspective of their planning
 Six general types of EA artifacts and city planning
documents and their type-specific roles in the context of
enterprise architecture and city planning practices
 The relationship and complementarity between different
types of EA artifacts and city planning documents
SK Based on the book The Practice of Enterprise Architecture: A Modern Approach to Business and IT Alignment #2
An EA Practice as City Planning

 An EA practice is a complex and multifaceted
organizational practice representing a sophisticated
interaction of various people, EA artifacts and processes
 The general mechanics of an EA practice is far from
trivial and can be best explained using close analogies
from other, more intuitive areas
 The practice of using enterprise architecture for
managing the evolution of organizations can be
compared to the practice of city planning
 The analogy between city planning and EA practices
provides an elegant illustration of what enterprise
architecture is and how enterprise architecture works
Analogy Between the Involved Actors

 Main actors of an EA practice have close analogies in
city planning
 Business executives can be compared to city governors
developing their city in the interests of its inhabitants
 IT project teams can be compared to construction project
teams responsible for constructing specific buildings
 Architects can be compared to city planners responsible
for the technical aspects of urban planning
 Both city planning and EA practices are continuous
activities intended to control the ongoing evolution of
complex dynamic systems
Common Properties of the Subjects

 Cities and organizations share many common properties
important from the perspective of their planning:
• Both have some valuable objects “visible” for their end users as
well as some “invisible” technical infrastructure
• Both cannot be perfectly planned in every detail
• Both cannot be designed and built from scratch
• Both run and evolve simultaneously
• Both evolve slowly in a continuous and path-dependent manner
• Their evolution is always limited by their current structures
• Poor planning decisions can hinder their further development
• Their evolution is endless and has no definite final state
• Both have no single best ways to evolve, but a set of options
Common Concerns of Planning

 Due to their common properties, all planning decisions in
city planning and EA practices have to take into account
a number of similar concerns:
• Decisions should be satisfactory from both the visible ultimate
value perspective and the invisible technical infrastructure
perspective
• Decisions should fulfill specific short-term needs and solve
current problems
• Decisions should also contribute to abstract long-term goals
• Decisions should take into account the current structures and
leverage them when possible
• Decisions should not create obstacles for the future evolution
Six Common Types of Documents

 EA artifacts help manage the evolution of an
organization, while city planning documents help
manage of the evolution of a city
 All EA artifacts can be separated into six general types:
• Considerations
• Standards
• Visions
• Landscapes
• Outlines
• Designs
 These six types of EA artifacts also have direct analogies
in a city planning practice
Commonalities Between Documents

 Considerations and Standards describe certain rules
defining an organization or city
 Visions and Landscapes describe the high-level
structure of an organization or city
 Outlines and Designs describe specific planned
incremental changes to an organization or city
 Considerations, Visions and Outlines describe an
organization or city through its “visible” ultimate value
 Standards, Landscapes and Designs describe an
organization or city from the perspective of its “invisible”
technical infrastructure
Commonalities Between Views

 Each type of documents answers different questions:
• Considerations - how an organization or city is organized from
the business or livability perspective
• Standards - how an organization or city is organized from the IT
or urban infrastructure perspective
• Visions - what the high-level structure of an organization or city is
from the business or livability perspective
• Landscapes - what the high-level structure of an organization or
city is from the IT or urban infrastructure perspective
• Outlines - what specific changes to an organization or city are
proposed from the business or livability perspective
• Designs - what specific changes to an organization or city are
proposed from the IT or urban infrastructure perspective
Taxonomy for Documents
Considerations (Contents)
 Considerations are abstract high-level guidelines or
imperatives defining an entire organization or city
 Considerations are important for business executives
and city governors at the same time also having
significant technology-related consequences for the
whole IT or urban landscape
Considerations (Usage)
 Considerations represent planning decisions and are
always established collaboratively by business
executives and architects for an organization or by city
governors and city planners for a city
 Considerations provide a common basis for all further
discussions and influence all planning decisions
 The dual nature of Considerations allows business
executives and city governors to implicitly shape their IT
or urban landscape, even though Considerations often
do not mention explicitly the IT or urban infrastructure
Standards (Contents)
 Standards are highly specialized low-level technical
guidelines prescribing how the IT or urban landscape
should be organized and built
 Standards are critically important for architects and city
planners, but largely irrelevant and meaningless for
business executives and city governors
Standards (Usage)
 Standards represent planning decisions and are always
established collectively by architects or city planners
based on their understanding of the best interests and
concerns of business executives or city governors
 Standards influence the designs of all individual IT
systems or buildings as well as the overall structure of
the IT or urban landscape
 Standards help reduce complexity and achieve
homogeneity of the IT or urban landscape, reuse proven
technical best practices, ensure compliance with the
existing regulatory norms and accelerate the
construction of new IT systems or buildings
Visions (Contents)
 Visions are abstract, often one-page diagrams providing
high-level views of an entire organization or city
 Visions are critical for business executives and city
governors, and also have direct implications for the IT or
urban landscape from the technology perspective
Visions (Usage)
 Visions are planning decisions developed collectively by
business executives and architects for an organization or
by city governors and city planners for a city
 Visions are consistent with Considerations
 Visions reflect the general future direction and suggest
what should be done in order to execute the business or
city development strategy
 The dual nature of Visions allows business executives
and city governors to implicitly develop their IT or urban
landscape in the right direction, even though Visions
often do not mention explicitly the IT or urban
infrastructure
Landscapes (Contents)
 Landscapes are formal diagrams describing the IT or
urban landscape from the technology perspective
 Landscapes are important for architects and city
planners, but virtually useless for business executives
and city governors
Landscapes (Usage)
 Landscapes represent documented facts and may be
developed and maintained for an organization or city by
individual architects or city planners alone
 Landscapes are used mostly by architects or city
planners and typically serve two different purposes:
• Help understand which IT or urban infrastructure is redundant,
unfit for purpose or aging and plan the replacement
• Help plan the designs of individual IT or construction projects
and connect new projects to the existing infrastructure
 Landscapes help rationalize the IT or urban
infrastructure, reuse existing assets and accelerate the
planning of new IT systems or buildings
Outlines (Contents)
 Outlines are high-level descriptions of separate IT or
construction projects from the perspective of value
 They provide relevant summary information regarding a
proposed new IT system or building, but do not contain
sufficient technical details to actually implement it
Outlines (Usage)
 Outlines represent planning decisions and are created
collaboratively by architects and business executives or
by city planners and city governors
 Outlines are initiated from Visions, consistent with
Considerations and leverage Standards and Landscapes
 Outlines inform business cases for IT or construction
projects and serve as main discussion points for them
 The dual nature of Outlines allows business executives
and city governors to control all IT or construction
investments, even though Outlines only briefly mention
the IT or urban infrastructure
Designs (Contents)
 Designs are detailed technical descriptions of separate
IT systems or buildings actionable for their implementers
 Designs provide IT or construction specialists with the
precise information required to deliver the project, but
are irrelevant to business executives and city governors
Designs (Usage)
 Designs represent planning decisions developed
collectively by architects and IT project teams for all IT
projects or by city planners and construction project
teams for all construction projects
 Designs are based on Outlines, follow Standards and fit
into Landscapes
 Designs are used by IT or construction project teams
responsible for implementing the project as planned
 The dual nature of Designs allows IT or construction
project teams to implicitly deliver globally optimized IT
systems, even though Designs do not describe explicitly
any global considerations
Mutual Alignment of EA Artifacts

 The alignment of one EA artifacts to the planning
decisions reflected in other EA artifacts enables the
connection and traceability between the business and IT
perspectives, strategic and tactical plans, organization-
wide and project-level decisions, global and local
concerns:
• Considerations impact all other types of EA artifacts
• Standards provide guidelines for Outlines and Designs
• Visions initiate the creation of new Outlines
• Landscapes provide the environment for Outlines and Designs
• Outlines provide the initial basis for developing Designs
• Designs to not influence other EA artifacts
Relationships Between EA Artifacts
Uniqueness of Different EA Artifacts

 Each of the six general types of EA artifacts and city
planning documents fulfills a specific purpose in the
context of an EA or city planning practice:
• Considerations help control the development of the IT landscape
• Visions help define the overall strategic direction
• Outlines help approve tactical steps towards the global direction
• Designs help optimize the IT landscape by means of embedding
globally optimized technical decisions into local IT projects
• Standards and Landscapes are used largely as reference
materials to facilitate optimal technical decision-making
Complementarity of Different EA Artifacts
Different EA Artifacts and Alignment

 The six general types of EA artifacts reinforce each other
and ensure that all IT projects in an organization:
• Fulfill local needs and requirements
• Contribute to long-term strategic goals and objectives
• Implemented rapidly in a predictable and cost-effective manner
• Reuse and leverage available IT assets
• Do not create redundant IT assets
• Can be reused and leveraged as IT assets in the future
• Built on technologies that the organization wants to continue
using in the future
• Implemented consistently with other similar projects
• Do not introduce complexity beyond necessity
The CSVLOD Model

 Considerations, Standards, Visions, Landscapes,
Outlines and Designs (CSVLOD) are the core
fundamental components of enterprise architecture
 The six-type CSVLOD model of enterprise
architecture explains the notion of EA as a set of six
complementary types of EA artifacts and provides a
robust evidence-based conceptualization of EA
 The CSVLOD model reflects the essence of all key EA
artifacts, actors and activities constituting an EA practice
 The CSVLOD model introduced in this lecture will be
used as the basis further in this course and described in
more detail later in Lecture 8
Lecture Summary
 The practice of enterprise architecture is conceptually
similar to the practice of city planning
 Both EA and city planning practices are based on the six
fundamental types of documents (CSVLOD):
• Considerations are abstract high-level guidelines or imperatives
• Standards are highly specialized low-level technical guidelines
• Visions are very abstract, often one-page high-level views
• Landscapes are formal models focused on the technical aspects
• Outlines are high-level non-technical descriptions of projects
• Designs are detailed technical descriptions of separate projects
 These six types of EA artifacts are interrelated,
complementary and even synergistic to each other
In the Next Lecture

 The next lecture will focus specifically on the
communication aspects of an EA practice and discuss in
detail the dialog between business and IT stakeholders
QUESTIONS?
Svyatoslav Kotusev, PhD
Copyright © 2019 by Svyatoslav Kotusev. All rights reserved.

Lecture 4 - Enterprise Architecture and City Planning

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Lecture 4 - Enterprise Architecture and City Planning

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Enterprise Architecture and City Planning

Svyatoslav Kotusev, PhD

Copyright © 2019 by Svyatoslav Kotusev. All rights reserved.

An EA Practice as City Planning

Analogy Between the Involved Actors

Common Properties of the Subjects

Common Concerns of Planning

Six Common Types of Documents

Commonalities Between Documents

Commonalities Between Views

Taxonomy for Documents

Mutual Alignment of EA Artifacts

Relationships Between EA Artifacts

Uniqueness of Different EA Artifacts

Complementarity of Different EA Artifacts

Different EA Artifacts and Alignment

The CSVLOD Model

In the Next Lecture

Copyright © 2019 by Svyatoslav Kotusev. All rights reserved.

You might also like